This encyclopedia is an attempt to coordinate and unify practical information on plastic, polymer, and resin trademark products. These categories overlap, i.e., plastics are a subset of polymers, and resins are often, but not always, polymers. However, it has been our aim to give the user of this compilation fingertip availability to a large quantity of essential information about these products. This three-volume compendium has been made possible through the cooperation of the major national and international plastic, polymer, and resin manufacturers.

The information provided here has been gleaned from thousands of brochures, technical bulletins, and data sheets, but the extent of the information provided for each product has been limited by the amount of data given to us by the manufacturers. Whenever possible and/or appropriate, we have given the chemical description, applications, form and color, general, mechanical, thermal, and electrical properties of each product. With the state of technological growth in these industries constantly increasing, this encyclopedia should serve as an important tool for chemists, engineers, and salespeople here and abroad.

We want to extend our thanks to Roberta Dakan for her tireless efforts in helping make this encyclopedia as accurate and consistent as possible. It should be noted that when the temperatures of properties such as viscosity, density, solubility, etc. are not included, a standard temperature of 25 C is to be assumed.